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Working Paper
What was behind the M2 breakdown?
A deterioration in the link between the M2 monetary aggregate and GDP, along with large errors in predicting M2 growth, led the Board of Governors to downgrade the M2 aggregate as a reliable indicator of monetary policy in 1993. In this paper, we argue that the financial condition of depository institutions was a major factor behind the unusual pattern of M2 growth in the early 1990s. By constructing alternative measures of M2 based on banks and thrifts capital positions, we show that the anomalous behavior of M2 in the early 1990s disappears. Specifically, after accounting for the effect of ...
Working Paper
Agency conflicts and thrift resolution costs
Working Paper
The determinants of the wealth effects of banks' expanded securities powers
After several unsuccessful attempts by Congress to repeal Glass-Steagall restrictions on banks, the Federal Reserve more than doubled the revenue that commercial banking organizations' securities subsidiaries may earn from certain securities activities. The wealth effects associated with this event for a sample of publicly traded banking organizations are examined. We find evidence that indicates the revenue limit resulted in a less-than-optimal mix of activities for securities subsidiaries. However, subsequent merger activity that could have been generated by the revenue increase was not ...